business owners

5+ Year Member

Looking at the "How much a dentist makes" thread, I was wondering what kind of education in running a business dental school provides. We will be trained to diagnose and treat oral health problems, but how will we learn to run a small business, many small businesses or possibly a dental corporate empire? How much one is able to make is directly related to how low the overhead can be kept and how well administrative/financial duties can be run.
Must we learn all of this on our own?
Not that that is a problem... just curious.

MUSC CLASS OF 2010

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5+ Year Member

Looking at the "How much a dentist makes" thread, I was wondering what kind of education in running a business dental school provides. We will be trained to diagnose and treat oral health problems, but how will we learn to run a small business, many small businesses or possibly a dental corporate empire? How much one is able to make is directly related to how low the overhead can be kept and how well administrative/financial duties can be run.
Must we learn all of this on our own?
Not that that is a problem... just curious.

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This I feel is something that you pick up on the streets. Trial and error is usually how it is done, according to the dentists I have spoken to earlier. You do as much research as you can, but ultimately it is what works that you stick with. I do not think Dental schools spend much time teaching you the business aspsects of Dentistry. They are more concerned with cramming clinical experience into the 4-year experience. Many altogether skip the practice management bit. Do your own research between now and when you graduate from D-school and you should be fine. You will be offering a service that is very much in demand, and that in itself should keep business moving.

5+ Year Member

If this is important to you (and it should be, since dentists are just tossed out into the business world, expected to run their own show!), Tufts has a 4-year practice management curriculum. Most schools offer some sort of coursework in the fourth year, or electives throughout, but Tufts has the most extensive I've seen.

Other schools encourage that you take classes with their business school. I'm hoping to take some personal/business finance courses because I know as much about running a practice as Paris Hilton knows how to act.......

But I think it's important to get SOME kind of education on this; not only do you have to figure out inventory and patient managment, but to hire an office manager, you need to know what you're looking for in the first place!!

"Your parole officer ain't even been born yet!" -Fin, Law & Order: SVU

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